SCORETOBER!!! Day 27 John Carpenter's The THING!!!
Day 27
The THING
SHOCKING! I know right? How is this not my top choice? Well because, there are still 4 more films after this!
This film is always in my top 3, easily. It always has and always will be. Its one I never tire of watching and has thankfully managed to age well. I enjoy watching people see it for the first time and getting their reactions, and the music speaks for itself.
What better way to begin our top 5. Of course it’d include a Carpenter film. In fact it’s SHOCKING my entire list isn’t JUST Carpenter films. Well that’ll teach you to assume.
So without further ado, lets get into our warm snuggy watch the best damn scifi horror.
Serioulsy this movie did not do well at the box office, at all. It came out at the same time as E.T. Apparently people really preferred cute friendly aliens over you know..flesh molding replicating aliens and dogs being killed.
It also went up against Rocky 3 AND Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, so. You know. A little competition.
The film
With a space craft headed toward earth, and a trash bag being burnt with a lighter to reveal the title card, or movie begins. Still funny that they used that for the opening title effects, but also weird how some people forget you get to see an alien ship at the very beginning. Much the same as you did with the film Predator.
But with that, our movie begins, and we are BACK in 1982, during the first goddamn week of winter in Antarctica.
WHICH, is a place I could’ve, and maybe should’ve worked as a cook. But I prioritized spending more time with my at that time girlfriend so. Here we are, I survived where I may not have, though I did face a fire beast which is a story for another time.
This one is far less limb pulling and bloody.
Possibly. Any way.
We are starting off with a beautiful shot of the frozen land that is Antarctica, and a Norwegian helicopter chasing after a poor wolf pup. Did the dog eat someones sandwich? Did it pee on the wrong boot? Did it escape a bad dog prison because it wanted to be a good boy? Who can say.
All we know is this helicopter isn’t just chasing it, but they are shooting at this wolf pupper, so either of my offered options is viable. But hitting a moving target is not as easy as you’d imagine, and we soon find out.
Nearby though, where the wolf seems to be headed, is the United States National Science Institute Station 4, otherwise known as Outpost 31. Within is the main cast of our film we will very shortly be meeting, as the helicopter buzzes above them and Mr wolfer runs like hell as the Norwegians begin tossing grenades!
They really don’t like this wild doggo, or they really enjoyed the boots he pee’d on.
As Wolfo makes his way closer to the camp, the Norwegians move to land the helicopter and play the deadliest game of fetch. Ready to toss a friendly grenade for the wild pooch. Only gloves can be slippery in the snow, and the grenade slips, falling into the snow. I don’t think you need a universal translator to know what the Norwegian says, but it is most likely ‘Diggity dang darnit”. He goes looking for his lost grenade as the other Norwegian quickly gets the hell away from the blast radius with his rifle. With that, the Helicopter, and the second Norwegian are blown to bits. This did not go as well as originally hoped.
But wolfer has made it to the camp and runs to the nearest open palmed human he can. Asking as quickly as he can ‘Am I a good boy?!’, the man is friendly to all dogs so of course he answers back ‘of course you are!’, The Norwegian however have a different opinion on that. Shouting back in Nordic, likely all the terrible none good boy things the wolfer did. Seeing as the bearded American doesn’t get it, he decides to revert back to his original tactic of shooting the wolf.
Apparently though, we learn not only is it hard to shoot a moving target, it’s also hard to hit a stationary target. As the Norwegian misses and shoots another man in the leg, and the wolf takes off once again. This is, really not going well.
Like at all. I mean great for the wolf yeah but. Man humans suck.
So needless to say the Americans get the hell out of the Norwegian mans way as he stomps off angrily and follows the wolf. Taking shots at him as he can while chasing after. He finally manages to get a clear line of sight on the wolf. He takes careful aim this time. Only to immediately get shot by one armed American with a Smith and Weston revolver. Shooting from the comfort of the heated station house, with a clear view of the Norwegian wolf hater.
And with that, the Norwegians game of Deadliest Catch with a pupper comes to an end.
As the shooting has stopped everyone is free to unpucker their assholes and get back up off the ground, and with that our poor friend, Bennings(Peter Maloney) can get some much needed medical attention for the shot he took in the leg. Even if he was lucky and the bullet just grazed him. Which Dr. Copper(Richard Dysart) does poke at him about. On the one hand, getting shot is no circus party, on the other hand he was grazed so the bullet only cut his skin, so the man shouldn’t be acting like he just lost his leg. I mean I get it. But Dr. Copper is right to mock him a little.
As those two finish up, it’s time for the group to discuss just what the hell happened. What would cause two men to go chasing after a wolf like that, let alone start shooting at people. Going insane is always an option, true. Or as Nauls(T.K. Carter) offers up to the group “Maybe we at war with Norway.”, either option is likely, and if the U.S. ever went to war with Norway, it’s say to assume we all did go insane.
Meanwhile Dr. Copper is wanting to investigate, he’s discovered the Norwegians have a camp nearby, so he wants to fly out there. Which brings in the manliest of men, the cream of the crop, a man that made me want to become a boat captain, The one and only Kurt Russel as MacReady.
MacReady is the station outpost helicopter pilot, he also possess the worlds greatest hat, A hat that tops even Lazlo’s cursed witch skin hat. We will get into that hat soon enough. Seriously the hat is the size of Falcore and could carry all of us on a magical adventure.
So even if Mac doesn’t believe flying is the greatest idea, unless you wanna crash and die, he’s going to take the doc on his excursion. The weather is unforgiving and they can barely see, but when a chance to get away from the same thing you stare at day in and day out comes along well, yeah.
Now we join or camps newest member, Mr wolf pupper. Who’s exploring the camp one room at a time, taking in new possible sites to mark, places for comfy rest and possible head pats. Which he seems to have found with someone alone in their room. Who though, we have no idea. But they have been chosen for the giving of head scritches.
Meanwhile at camp Norwegian(Not Swedish as MacReady keeps calling them) we are beginning to get a sense of what happened exactly. Which is chaotic at best. The large outpost camp is nearly destroyed. Small fires took out most the rooms, the ceiling completely torn out in others. A bloody axe driven through a door. Large holes in walls like something went rampaging through. But most memorable of all, a screaming mans body is found, frozen in his chair, where he slit his own throat, and the blood froze still dripping from his razor.
Well that is until they get outside at least. That tops all of it.
But before we get there, MacReady has made his own discovery. He’s found a large block of ice the length of two grown men, left at the center of a large storage room. Hollowed out. Why? Don’t know, can’t say. WON’T say. Not yet. But it’s damn odd.
However the best/worst find and their final one before ending their adventure. Lays outside in the snow, amid a large pile of destroyed fuel tanks. The burned remains of a still very bloody, highly disfigured, mutilated looking remains of…something resembling two humans. But melded together.
Which sounds as horrifying as it sounds, and to add on to that image for you.It happens as well in hot enough fires put out suddenly. You can have flesh melt and burn, melding to objects or other limbs. Your welcome for that.
So with the find of the century. Our team move back to the helicopter and head back to base camp. As they do, they are being watched by a very curious to see what they found wolfer. Perhaps he’s worried they dug up some bones he buried and will now have to reclaim as his and rebury. It happens. Soon though the entire group is outside and helping to unload the large mutated mass of burnt flesh and bone to their medical lab. Where an autopsy is definitely top priority, as is sharing their discovery with the rest of the team. Dr. Copper can only surmise that perhaps the Norwegians found something trapped in the ice, and it got out? Once it did perhaps it wreaked havoc on the camp. But what he has no clue, and why they’d bring an animal to camp, also no clue. Helping Dr. Copper with his new autopsy is none other than our second doctor, Dr. Blair. Played by the man of legend himself, Mr. Cocoon, Mr. Diabeetus, Long may he be remembered, the late wonderful Wilford Brimley. He’s a lot of fun in this for, moments we are definitely going to be enjoying later.
To this group of curious spectators and commentors we also are introduced to Fuchs(Joel Polis) who is…for some reason…sniffing torn dirty mostly burnt Norwegian jumpsuits………okay.
Our groups man in charge Garry(Donald Moffat) who is rather irritated to find their communications man Windows(Thomas G Waites) asleep at the radio instead of busying himself with trying to reach someone on the radio to report what they’ve found and what happened with the Norwegian helicopter.
To say no one has any idea what the hell the body or bodies are they found, let alone if it’s even human. Is pretty accurate. Although Blaire does seem to believe it could be human as it contains heart, liver, kidneys. All perfectly normal. Even if the rest of the body is far from normal.
Major props to the prop department, because this is genuinely creepy as hell and one of the highlights of the film, it’s still haunting and looks every bit as gruesomely beautiful as it did back then, just now in wonderful 4k. Thank the maker.
Well not everyone can stand around staring at bodies all day. They got work to do and those two doctors have a project now. So as evening approaches and everyone settles in, Palmer(David Clennon) is loading in the nights entertainment into his VCR with his buddy Childs(Keith David) as the two share a joint, which seems to be the main job of Palmer, rolling fatties and blunts. The rest of our intrepid group busy themselves with playing pool and cards, reminding me even more what I missed out on by not being a cook in Antarctica and instead being a responsible goddamn boyfriend, The only man not happy, is still our poor friend who was shot at earlier today, he’s irritated still and even more so when he discovers that pupper is STILL freely roaming the base and rubbing up against him, he doesn’t appreciate that! So he grumbles out at the keeper of the dogs, the giver of belly rubs and head pats Clark(Richard Masur). He tells Clark to lock that wolf pup up with the other doggos! Yes there are multiple happy borking comfy doggos and Clark is proud of them all. So he takes our newest camp member who seems all to calm and polite trying to make a good impression on the camp, saddened he got yelled out but calmly he walks beside Clark and into the dog kennel with the others. Which is fine for the pupper it seems. The other dogs are interested that there’s a new doggo there, but not really too interested since its late and they all want to relax and chill.
But our new wolf pupper is a little tense and kinda just looking unsure. Which they should be I guess since it’s possible these dogs won’t know how to react among an escaped dog from the good boy academy of Norway.
Once Clark is gone though, the other dogs begin to sniff the air and new doggo. Only to discover he doesn’t smell as nice as them. In fact he doesn’t smell like them at all.
Because he ISN’T LIKE THEM!! That’s not a good boy pupper at all! It’s a goddamn alien! The wolf splits its skull open, much to the disapproval of the nearby innocent puppers and begins establishing its dominance by NOT PEEING ON THINGS LIKE A DOG!! But instead ripping the others to shreds. Jabbing them with alien limbs and spewing who knows what onto the others. Its mass carnage and these poor dogs did NOT sign up for this. Whoever said the dog should be locked up was an ass and needs their dick stomped.
MacReady hears the dogs howling and raising all kinds of alarm bell howling. MacReady is able to decipher their borking and pulls the fire alarm, alerting everyone shit’s going down.
Clark was headed to the kennel to investigate himself, only to be met with a leaping dog doing its best to run the hell away from the monstrosity within the kennel, knocking him down in the process. He doesn’t see what’s in there, but he can hear it and the dogs crying. He backs up into the hallway just as Macready makes his way into the room with a shotgun, greeting Clark and leading to our first fun quote of the film, “I don’t know what’s in there, but it’s weird and pissed off.”
MacReady approaches the kennel, a group forming behind him all curious to see what’s going on. He shines a light into the kennel and is immediately greeted to one hell of a nightmare. Some dogs look like they’ve been torn apart. Others skinless and crying. Others pinned to the wall with multiple tentacle like things protruding from their body. In the middle of the room a large fleshy, bloody mass of mutated animals howling and hissing.
Without hesitation MacReady begins firing away. At both the creature in the center of the room, and ending the suffering of the poor pups. It’s too much for Clark to take seeing his beloved dogs cry out and being shot, put down. He tries stopping MacReady only get get pushed back. Very soon however Macready realizes he’s going to need a lot more firepower. He shouts out for the flamethrower.
Childs hears this and can’t imagine any use what so ever let alone indoors a flamethrower would serve, but he grabs it strapping the pack on. Once he makes way into the kennel he quickly sees exactly what use a flamethrower would be in this situation, indoors.
The creature is not enjoying being discovered, let alone shot at and its trying to escape. A large, muscular slimy arm punches out from the mutilated dog pile in the rooms center and from it shoots out a clawed hand, punching into the ceiling and grabbing hold. At the same time an appendage from this thing opens up like a horrifying flower blooming and displays a circle of sharp fangs. Which it sends directly toward the group. Forcing Childs out of his state of shock, and letting loose with his flamethrower. Torching the creature immediately, and setting the room on fire.
With that the creature now is the one howling in pain, tortured and screaming, until it finally seems to die and stops moving.
When the group see’s this two others immediately move forward with extinguishers and put out the blazing fire and corpse. Meaning now, our science lab has two large unidentifiable bodies in it. This time with a freshly mutated body containing a combination of dog bones, limbs and heads, fused with unknown larger bones and half formed/deformed dog skulls.
Blair was having a boring day but now? Now he’s got work for weeks!
In one of the funnest scenes, and not nearly grossest scenes. Blair begins pulling off loose limps, and opens up the stomach cavity of the creature. Reaching in and retracting a solid bone mass. The fun is his large range of facial reactions and noises of disgust he makes, Wilford said when they filmed the scene he was picturing opening his garbage back of laundry and smelling the scent of dozens of collected dirty socks. Bless his heart.
Once again, we are left with both a horrific monstrosity of a sculpted organism that is not remotely normal. Yet its organs are all normal. Much like the original corpse thing they discovered in the snow. Which only adds to their confusion and the mystery around this thing.
But Blaire is working on a theory. One he, for the time, is keeping to himself. He ask Clark for help in taking blood samples from the surviving few dogs that remain, and questions Clark as well. Asking about the strange dog, why it was allowed to roam the camp all day, how long it was out for, where did it go. How long was Clark with the dog alone. It annoys Clark eventually but Blaire neverminds it and tells him he was just curious, but the wheels are turning, and Blaire is on to something he feels.
Meanwhile Copper, MacReady, Garry and Bennings begin going through some of the items they brought back with them from the Norwegian outpost. A couple of charts, videos and photos. While watching the video they begin to get something of a better understanding just what that group stumbled onto. Through the video we see the Norwegians celebrating a discovery they made under the nice, digging a and exploding a large parameter of ice. They’ve also marked off with flags what seems to be the odd holo’d out block of ice MacReady spotted at the camp before. The group is able to pinpoint just about where these sites are on their map, and MacReady is a hell of a lot more agreeing this time to fly out and investigate. He wants to know what those people found and what the hell they brought back to their camp and destroyed. So off we gooooo!
On another magical adventure in MacReadies hat. For definitely one of the cooler and more appreciative shots in the film. As we found the large spot in the ice they used dynamite to blast under, and within this large crater beneath the ice? Is none other than the space craft we saw during the opening credits as he crash landed on earth. Given the depth of the craft and layers of ice that formed over the top of it, Dr Copper can only guestimate roughly at how long the ship had been there. But his guess would put it at roughly over a hundred thousand years. Not far from the crashed ship site, is where they discover the large cut out block of ice as well. Now having something of a better idea what happened, it would appear that this ship may have crashed in Antarctica long ago, and the pilot or one of from the craft crawled out and froze to death in the snow. So the Norwegian expedition team came across this somehow, uncovered the ship and later discovered the possible remains of an alien from the ship. Which now unfortunately might explain what happened to them back at the base, and why they were after the dog. What it doesn’t however explain is why one of the men slit his own throat and the men burning their camp unless it happened while battling this creature. MacReady feels maybe the thing woke up somehow after being dug up. He’s not a scientist or UFO expert so he has no idea. Just his own theories.
As the group returns. With stacks of photos from the expedition, as well as recovering now some of the pieces of ship debris. They are still pretty scared and shook up over what happened. But still trying to understand it all too. Because well, honestly yeah. If an alien crashed its ship, unluckily in the coldest part of our world. Why would it crawl out of its ship? I mean if its on fire sure yeah. Buts ship was mostly in tact aside from where it looks like something breached the inside. So naturally puzzled abound!
Especially for Blaire, who is even more quiet now since his talk with Clark about the dogs, and now going over all this information the group uncovered from their outing across the pond. Blair is finally going to clue us the audience in on his theory based off what he’s seen so far and deduced.
Rather obviously this creature somehow replicated the dog which allowed it to go by without seeming to be a threat. Once alone the dog/thing attacked the other dogs because it had been discovered, and had no one been there to stop the dog/thing from what it was doing. It likely would’ve made copies of those dogs as well. Replicating itself further. Now the big question is, if that creature was able to perfectly replicate an animal, right down to its organs as he discovered with the autopsy. It’s safe to assume the animal was itself a replicant of the original creature. Which means it infects its host where it is unable to assimilate them and ‘become’ them.
Now that carries a new worry and risk. The possibility of they themselves being or becoming infected from the dog/thing. He’s confirmed this as even the dogs they had to put down, that were attacked by the creature, showed mutation in their cells. So it had begun to replicate within the body and destroy the original host. So if contact can cause infection, what’s the likelihood of one of his friends and the group now being infected? So he ask his computer that very question. Based on all the data he’s given it and the test he’s run as well as running a computer simulation on how long it took that creature from the on set of the attack to the point they destroyed it to replicate and begin mutating the dogs. He ask the computer what are the chances at least one member of their group has been infected by this alien organism, The computer tells him flatly 75%. Which honestly, is not good odds, gotta say. So he travels deeper into his rabbit hole he created with this theory and ask his pc the scarier question. If the intruder organism reaches civilived areas, whats the likely scenario. Answer: Entire world population infected 27,000 hours from first contact.
That’s 1,125 days
Or three years and one month for those who wondered.
So yeah, not exactly an idea thing to hear, and definitely a reason to begin deeply questioning who you can trust. Now, Blair finds himself in a tough spot, having to make even tougher decisions.
Meanwhile poor MacReady is being asked to move his belongings out of storage so they can go ahead and store the ‘Find of the Century’ there, yep. The mangled mutilated and unthawing remains of the nearly replicated human mess from the Norwegian camp is now the find of the century and being kept safely in storage. But before MacReady can start drinking and go to bed, Fuchs wants to talk to him alone, in a snow blow in minus 40 temperatures. That just sounds like a whole mess of fun right there.
MacReady is not happy, first having to gather and move his crap, then he had a full day flying to and from a base that was destroyed, fought a creature from another world. Man has had a full day and its time to crack a cold on. So he’s not exactly the most patient person with Fuch’s, but he’s worried and feels the only person he can trust of MacReady, He’s worried about Blair because he might actually be onto something, and has shut himself off from everyone in the camp. He went through Blaire’s journal and found even more troubling news. Which, thankfully he shall share as he reads from the journal aloud, “It could have imitated a million life-forms on a million planets. It could change into any one of them at any time. Now, it wants life-forms on Earth. It needs to be alone and in close proximity with the life-form to be absorbed. The chameleon strikes in the dark There is still cellular activity in these burned remains. They're not dead yet!”, Well that certainly grabbed MacReady by the short and curly hairs.
With that, and back inside the much warmer outpost. We see the blanket placed over the defrosted remains of the mutilated human pile begin to move and show signs of life. Within moments It attacks Bennings, Windows(Thomas G. Waites) wonders into the room to talk to Bennings, only to find him unavailable as he has tentacles wrapping around and inside his body. So he rightly runs the hell out of the room and races outside for MacReady. Telling him and Fuchs what he saw. The men run through the outpost and find Bennings running unsteadily in the snow until he collapses into it. The group make their way outside and circle the poor man they knew as they friend. Finding him now unable to speak, a horrific alien howl coming from his mouth. His right hand deformed, with elongated fingers, a large mass of muscle instead of a foot and a deformed chest. MacReady kicks over a nearby fuel drum watching it flow and pool around Bennings, before using a signal flare to ignite the fuel and burning Bennings to death. With that MacReady tells the others to gather the remains of the dogs, the dog monster. Everything that was infected by this creature. They use a plow to dig a pit and a large bonfire is lit. This time letting everything burn to an absolute crips. Leaving nothing behind before plowing over the burnt remains. Even MacReady is starting to get the same thoughts Blair was having, wondering if that thing could infect and begin replicating someone that quickly. Who’s to say others in the group might not already be infected.
As he wonders this though, he spots Blair out by one of the helicopters. He calls out to the man but he runs off back into the outpost before he can get near him. In his hands Blair holds an Axe. MacReady makes his way to the helicopter, only to discover Blair has gutted the controls. He took an axe to everything and destroyed the helicopter. As if that’s not enough, he soon hears bullets being shot inside the outpost. Running back inside he discovers everyone hiding as Blair works hard between shooting keeping the others at bay, and using the axe to destroy the radio and computer equipment. It’s both a funny and creepy scene. As he destroys the room he’s shouting like a madman, monologuing “You guys think I'M crazy! Well, that's fine! Most of ya don't know what's goin' on around here, but I'm damn well sure SOME of you do! D'ya think that thing wanted to be an animal? No dogs make it a thousand miles through the cold! No, you don't understand! That thing wanted to be US! If a cell gets out, it could imitate everything on the FACE OF THE EARTH! AAAAND NOTHING can stop it!”, The fun comes from when the group tries talking to him and distracting Blair, which happens to fall on Childs to try and talk Blair down, “Okay Blair. Come on, man, you don’t wanna hurt anybody.”, hearing this Blair turns to Childs, pulls out his revolver and gives the delivery of a lifetime in a line that Kurt Russel and John Carpenter both admit makes them laugh every time they hear, “I’LL KILL YOUUU!”, he says it in the most authentic out of nowhere cowboy way. It seriously is something to hear and it never gets old. I love it.
With that and Blairs attention turned toward Childs, Macready and the others rush in using a table as a shield. Blair has enough time to bury his axe into the table but that’s all. The men are on him and knock him out. Restraining him and leading him outside the camp, and to an outdoor shed. It’s cold as balls outside, but no one wants crazy in the camp. So MacReady goes in and hands the Doc a bottle of Vodka to keep him warm and hydrated, “How you doin’ old boy?”, Blair smiles a bit out of his mind up at MacReady and quietly tells him he doesn’t know who to trust. So Macready nods, admitting trust is a bit hard to come by these days and to relax there, maybe trust in the lord. As he moves to exit the shack Blair gives one final word of advice to MacReady, feeling he may still be someone he might be able to trust as not being infected, “Watch Clark. Watch Clark, you hear me?”
With that MacReady studies his face for a while and turns to close and lock the door behind him. Leaving Blair to think about what he’s done.
With Blair now secured, the question is very quickly becoming, who can you trust? At MacReady is not afraid to say he doesn’t think everyone is who they say they are. Even Childs accepts this and ads as well, “If I were a perfect imitation, how would you know? It seems like the creature once it does get a hold of you. Lays in wait before making itself known, it doesn’t want to be discovered so it’s not going to make itself stand out, it’ll stay quiet or in the background possibly. Or it might try and feed paranoia if it helps keep it safe. Thankfully Dr. Copper has an idea. He’s been working on the idea of a blood test possibly helping them to figure out if there’s an infection. He’s rather certain it’ll work. Well anytime a doctor says ‘I’m certain it’ll work.” That gains the confidence of anyone around them. So off to the lab we go for some blood testing!
Only then do we discover, someone else had that same thought, as the camps blood supply has been destroyed. Leaving no clear samples they can test against new blood sample to see if there’s been a change and identify who may be an imitation.
This also raises a few more red flags, as now we have to ask ourselves. Who destroyed the blood supply? There are only two people with access to it, and both men are ready to defend their position in the “I am still human’ camp.
It would appear Dr. Copper of course has access to the blood, but he only gains access through a key which, he has to borrow from the master of keys, Garry. It’s a great introduction into the self preservation, don’t shoot me shoot him paranoia they now face as one man accuses the other of having the key last, how no one could take the key without it being noticed. When was it last borrowed and by who, did they return it immediately after. It all proves too much for poor Windows, who rushes off for the weapons cabinet. Breaking the glass and arming himself. The group rush off to stop him and Garry just so happens to still have his revolver. He takes aim at Windows and orders him to drop the gun. Windows cries out to the others, asking how any of them can trust him since they don’t know if he’s human or not. Which. Is fair. So Once Windows drops the gun, Garry relaxes his grip on the revolver and surrenders the weapon, “I don't know about Copper... but I give you my word I did not go near that blood! But I guess you'd all feel a little easier if somebody else was in charge. Norris, I can't see somebody objecting to you”, The group feels more at ease and hearing his name mentioned as possible new leadership, Norris(Charles Hallahan) shakes his head and gives a concerned look, “I'm sorry fellas, but I-I-I'm not up to it.”. With that MacReady claims the gun, and title of leader, for now.
He orders the men to collect the tainted blood and dump it all into another hole in the snow. Setting fire once more. With that he looks across to each of the men and speaks his mind, “I know I'm human. And if you were all these things, then you'd just attack me right now, so some of you are still human. This thing doesn't want to show itself, it wants to hide inside an imitation. It'll fight if it has to, but it's vulnerable out in the open. If it takes us over, then it has no more enemies, nobody left to kill it. And then it's won.”
With that he tells the others to secure three of the men. He’s sure of some of them, but he also has his own doubts on a few. Mainly Clark, Copper and Garry. They seem to be the only ones who have had anyone speak out against them. So he wants them watched, and readied or samples before the others. As they do so, he returns to his place and makes a recording, which will be his last, and one of the coolest finds you come across in the playstation sequel game.
“I'm gonna hide this tape when I'm finished. If none of us make it, at least there'll be some kind of record. The storm's been hitting us hard now for 48 hours. We still have nothing to go on. One other thing: I think it rips through your clothes when it takes you over. Windows found some shredded long johns, but the nametag was missing. They could be anybody's. Nobody... nobody trusts anybody now, and we're all very tired. Nothing else I can do, just wait... R.J. MacReady, helicopter pilot, US outpost number 31.”
With that MacReady is off and patrolling the camp, stopping in to check on Fuchs as the scientist goes over the samples he got from those in the camp. Ready to hopefully begin clearing peoples names and calling out the immitations.
However, that might not be so simple.
Hours pass and MacReady is gathering volunteers to go with him, he’s taking Windows and Nauls with him. Fuchs has gone missing, his work missing as well. So the trio head out into the cold, searching one building to the next. Until Nauls happens across a scorched mark in the snow. As he approaches he finds Fuchs’s crashed glasses. Burns along with a body and his clothes. It looks as though Fuchs has taken his own life. It’s been something long debated over concerning the film. Where people believe he may have found his own blood sample showed up as tainted so he decided to kill himself before the creature could take over him. Others think perhaps he was taken out by whoever actually was the Thing, fearing he'd uncover the truth and warn the others. Honestly there are hours, days even of papers written and sites full of them with peoples theories and facts to support them on this alone. It’s actually pretty interesting if a little troubling just how much people put into it.
With Fuchs found the group is ready to head back inside. Well two out of the three men are at least. MacReady is not. He wants to take a look at his shack. Because he turned out the lights last night, and now the lights in his shack are back on.
This, is a key moment if you hadn’t been taking notes, you absolutely should get in on the fun, and begin doing so now. Because oh boy is this game gonna get fun.
45 minutes have passed since the three left the outpost, Childs is getting antsy and the others worry for their own lives when the three return. Childs decides its been long enough and tells the others(Minus those tied up) they need to secure the outside doors, the temperature is dropping and those three are likely lost. But Norris notices something outside, A bright red flare in the harsh snow piling up. One of the men is stumbling back and in a hurry. It’s Nauls. His entire suit and flamethrower covered in frost. The men let him in and quickly secure the door. He’s panting and telling the others he had to cut MacReady free. He pulls out from his coat the remains of a turn lightly scorched jumpsuit baring MacReady’s name on the back. He tells them he found it stuffed in the furnace of MacReady’s shack. He tells them Mac had it hidden there and the moment he saw it, he cut free of the line the two used to secure each other together, and ran back to the camp.
Soon after he says this, the doorhandle begins to turn left and right. MacReady wants in.
Childs shouts at the door and the others wait, weapons drawn ready. But MacReady has moved on. The others suddenly remember there’s one other door they’d not gotten too. Finding the door to this room now locked, they know MacReady has made it into the camp, and is now in this room. Childs takes an axe and begins hammering away, splintering the door. Just as his efforts pay off and the group can rush in to grab him. Everyone stops and considers being a lot more polite to MacReady. Mostly because he’s Kurt Fucking Russell, but also because Mac is holding a flare in one hand and a huge roll of dynamite in the other. Threatening to blow the camp if anyone comes near him. He begins stepping out of the room, Childs and the others cautiously backing off. As for the unseen others? They wait on the other side of the door and pounce MacReady. However he’s able to fight them off, tossing both Norris and Childs off of himself.
Only when Norris falls back he begins going into what appears to be a heart attack. Gasping as he slumps in the corner and finally goes quiet. The others rushing to his side checking on him. MacReady, still holding his flare and dynamite, he orders the others to untie Copper from the couch and get him to work helping Norris, and to bring the others in the same room. Wanting to make sure he can keep an eye on everyone. With that Copper is jumping into action, with Windows assisting. He begins pumping his fist into the mans chest trying to kick start his heart but its not enough. He calls out for the paddles and shocks Norris’s chest. Still nothing. He goes and tries for another shock with the paddles. Only this time he is successful.
Successful not so much in the “I saved the mans life” way, but more in the “Oh god what the hell is that” way. As Norris’s chest opens up into a gaping horrific mouth of bones, Copper’s hands sinking into the empty cavity. The bone teeth chomp down and immediately sever the doctors hands at the wrist.
With that Copper is down and immediately being turned into one of those things. MacReady torches the table and corpse immediately, frying both men. But not before one of the more memorable scene in the movie can happen. As the head of Norris begins pulling itself free from the body. Using its tongue to whip around a desk leg and pull itself into hiding. The head soon sprouts legs, like a spider, and two eyes pop out on antenna . The head takes off skittering across the floor and Palmer gives us another great line as the group watches the skittering creature head. “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.”
And with that MacReady sets fire to a now tap dancing monster head as it burns to death.
Bringing us, at long last. To the most famous of scenes from this classic film, and one yet to be topped by any other like it since.
The Blood Test.
MacReady is done with this shit, he’s tired of guessing who is who, and doesn’t like being called something he knows he isn’t. Clark is slowly creeping up on MacReady, while agreeing with anything he says, trying to lower his defenses. But MacReady is onto it and points a gun at the man stopping him. Childs doesn’t think MacReady will shoot, let alone have enough ammo for everyone, as his back is turned to Clark, Clark rushes at MacReady and without hesitation MacReady shoots the man in the forehead.
He is very clearly making it known this shit show stops now
So he has everyone but Windows tied up now. He’s using his flamethrower to heat a piece of copper wiring while Windows goes around man to man, with glasses dishes, and gathers blood samples from everyone. Everyone gets across their thumbs a larger than needed cut with a scalpel and their blood put into a dish.
Now even though he had windows help him. He needs to test him to make sure he’s really trustworthy. So Windows is our first test subject. MacReady takes the blood sample from Windows and touches the heated copper wire to the blood. As the wire hisses and nothing happens. He feels Windows has been cleared. He figures if this thing is threatened, in anyway, even a small part of it, it’ll lash out and expose itself. Seeing as there was no reaction from the blood, this means Windows is safe.
So for the benefit of the group, he then test his own blood. The same result. Nothing. So now its time to test the two seemingly dead men. Norris and Clark.
But again, nothing. Which means MacReady murdered Clark, as Childs points out to MacReady. Garry is all for calling this entire test out as bullshit, Mac informs him he’ll be tested last, but next up for testing is Nauls, the man sighs with an “oh well” look on his face. MacReady test his blood. With that we see a small monster leap up from the blood sample. Freaking out MacReady. Instantly the men tied up beside Palmer regret their position on the couch with him and scream for help as Palmer begins revealing himself as the Imitation. Freeing himself in monster form from the couch and attacking poor Windows. Palmer head splits open, revealing a large gory split head full of teeth and a large tongue spitting out the core, wrapping around Windows neck, choking the man as it snaps and draws Windows into its open mouth and begins chewing on the mans head.
MacReady is struggling with the flamethrower, fighting to get the thing to fire, but its temperamental and having issues. Possibly from being used so long to idly heat the wire. Eventually it turns on full blast and he fries the Palmer creature. Killing it before it can manage killing anyone else. Moments after he’s destroyed Palmer, Childs and Garry shout out from the still somehow intact couch screaming out Window’s name. We see Windows beginning to reanimate, already beginning his mutations. MacReady turns around and burns Windows body to a crisp as well.
With that, Mac recruits Nauls as his new flamethrower buddy and test the blood samples of Childs and Garry. It’s hilarious as the two men watch. Childs taking deep breaths ready for whatever happens, and Garry just looking absolutely floored with where he is in his life right now and being as done with all of it as anyone could ever be.
As Childs blood comes back negative the man sighs in relief and immediately begins screaming for the others to untie him, not wanting to be anywhere NEAR Garry when his test is taken. The look on Garry’s face is pure gold as he again, is just done with all of this and everyone. So once they test Gerry, two men now on MacReady’s side stand a little ‘too’ ready to torch Garry. But his test comes back fine and he gets to deliver another great line for the film, “I know you gentlemen have been through a lot, but when you find the time, I'd rather not spend the rest of this winter TIED TO THIS FUCKING COUCH!”
So now, we have our final band of survivors. MacReady, Childs, Nauls and Garry.
But. We also have one other forgotten face. Dr. Blair. He’s still out there in his little shack. So the group head out to check on him and test him as well. Only. He’s no longer there. They enter the shack and soon discover he has kept VERY busy, digging himself a tunnel. Or perhaps one already somewhat existed.
But within this tunnel, is more than they could’ve ever imagined. They discover inside the underground tunnel that. Well. Apparently Dr. Blair had been very busy. Building an escape ship from parts around the camp. Parts from the snow plows, the helicopter, anything. It’s rather impressive and an oh shit moment when you see just how much he accomplished this entire time on his own, and furthers the question, was he infected the whole time? Or did it happen later on?
The group has to formulate a survival plan now as Blair is obviously out there and on the run. So they blow up his little ship and head back to the camp to try and see if Blair destroyed the generator. MacReady ask Garry to go take a look and as he does he delivers one of my favorite best delivered moments,
Garry: The generator’s gone.
MacReady: Any way we can fix it?
Garry: It’s “gone”, MacReady.
The look on his face, the utter hopelessness in his voice. It’s beautifully tragic, and the added reaction from MacReady as he realizes what that means too. “Blair, he got back inside and blew the generator. In six hours, it’ll be 100 below in here.” Mac announces to the group, Garry steps up “”Well that’s suicide!” Mac shakes his head and stares back at the last of their small group, “Not for that thing. It wants to freeze now. It knows it’s got no way out of here. It just wants to go to sleep in the cold until the rescue team finds it.”, it’s a cold realization hitting the group one after the other as MacReady already realized and informs them all of the one thing they have left they know they have to do. “Whether we make it or not, we can’t let that Thing freeze again. Maybe we’ll just warm things up a little around here. We’re not gettin outta here alive. But neither is that Thing.”
And with that. MacReady readies the group. Their job is to gather the dynamite from the storage room, plant it underneath the camp, and blow it all up. Nauls begins setting things up on his end and Garry on his. Only Garry spots something moving and goes to investigate it. Which I agree is entirely stupid on his part. But the man does it and pays for it, as he discovers Blair. Blair puts a hand over his mouth to silence Garry, and, at the same time. His hand melds into Garry’s flesh and soon sinks into the mans mouth killing him. Not soon after Nauls hears something and he too, unfortunately is taken by Blair.
MacReady realizing he’s alone sets up the detonator. He calls out to the group receiving no answer and seeing no sign of Childs either. He stands quietly and listens. Soon a sign of life shows up! As the boards on the group shoot upward suddenly and the Thing chases MacReady from underground. Mac takes off in a full on sprint until he tumbles to the ground. With that the Thing pops out from the ground in all its horrific glory, a towering beast of a combination of all its victims from the camp. Two tentacles shoot out from underneath and latch onto the detonator swallowing it up and taking it down. Mac is screwed and he knows it.
But again,because it bares repeating. He is Kurt Fucking Russell. He is never truly done. He grabs a stick of dynamite and does a barrel roll away from the creature, lights the stick and as the beast roars out gives the most honest final boss line ever, “Yeah, well fuck you too!” tossing the dynamite and running like hell.
The entire camp explodes. Absolutely nothing is left standing. It’s all one large unreal fire ball of black smoke and flames.
MacReady sits in the snow, catching his breath, resting against a fuel container. Watching the fires burn, hearing something to his side he turns and looks. It’s Childs. Childs looking down at him ask “You the only one who make it? Did you kill it?” MacReady nods and corrects him. “Not the only one. Where were you, Childs?”
It’s a very legitimate question, Childs nods and tells MacReady how he thought he saw Blair, went out after him and ended up lost in the storm.
Childs: Fore’s got the temperature up all over the camp. Won’t last long though.
MacReady: Neither will we.
Childs: How will we make it?
MacReady: Maybe we shouldn’t…
Childs: If you’re worried about me….
MacReady: If we got any surprises for each other, I don’t think we’re in much shape to do anything about it.
Childs: Well. What do we do?
MacReady: Why don’t we just…wait here for a little while. See what happens.
And with that, Childs joins him on the ground, MacReady leans forward and offers him his bottle of J&B Scotch and Childs gratefully takes a drink. MacReady smirks and gives a chuckle, before leaning back, and the two men watch one another while the fire burns, and the movie rolls credits.
The End
This movie is and always will be in my top three of all time. It’s part of Carpenters ‘End of the World’ trilogy of films, it’s the best science fiction horror film, I will say ever. Don’t even fight me on it. It is.
It captures perfectly the paranoia, the isolation, testing of friendship and self preservation. The faults of humans and on an almost Hitchcock level the tension and games being played by the creature to keep itself hidden. It’s all just so absolutely perfect. The cast is amazing, the writing spot on. Everything from how it was shot, the set ups for each scene. It’s absolutely classic and so many films after have tried replicating and touching on the same levels this film touched. But none of them come close, and I don’t mind saying pun or otherwise, end up poor imitations.
Watching the film multiple times after, you pick up on little subtle hints as to who could be infected. People have done charts as to when who got infected, who possibly got infected and when/how/by who. There are so, so many countless websites out there dedicated to this and everyones theories.
The endless debate on was Childs or MacReady infected? Were they both clean? Did Childs infect himself drinking the booze offered by MacReady? Is that why he chuckled after the man took the drink? Did Childs really run off because he saw Blair? No one knows, and Carpenter loves it. He will not, even to his dying day, he will not tell anyone who was or wasn’t infected in the end. Only he knows, and he loves how mad it drives people. The man has a bromance with Kurt Russell and he loves Captain Ron for gods sake, and the man won’t even tell Kurt if he was infected or not at the end of the film. The commentary these two do together is incredibly funny and Kurt gives Carpenter a LOT of shit about this. It’s great.
I could easily go on about my own theories and timeline of events, because believe me I not only have them. I believe I have it perfectly nailed down too. I’m that damn sure of it. But we are here for the review, and now…
The Music.
The main thing that put this movie up on this list, and I am sure blew away many minds that I did not list it on the top of my list. Which, was I tempted too? A little but not really. Because I have those top spots reserved, trust me the top two have been there for many, many years for me.
This score is stunning, amazing, moody, and beautiful.
It comes from a collaboration and combined effort on the part of both John Carpenter, and Ennio Morricone.
Yes, Ennio Morricone worked on this score. He was someone Carpenter had dearly wanted to work with and this project turned out to be that one they finally got too.
It was a very difficult score because Carpenter, up until then had scored all of his own movies, and he sort of became tied to having that creative title and addition to his films. He loved that his films had that “Carpenter sound” to them. But this was his first big budget Hollywod film and he was getting an actual composer. But as much as he loved and respected Morricone, he told him to keep the tone in line with his other films. He had him work with similar synths and gave a few directions to him on what he wanted. The first score Morricone delivered, Carpenter was a huge fan of. He said it had a few too many flourishes and notes. It didn’t feel like his own music, or something he felt fit the film. He told Morricone this and he had no problem taking those notes and changing them around. Once he did Carpenter fell in love with it. For a majority of the film Morricone worked off of notes from Carpenter and on other tracks the two worked together creating the sound of The Thing.
It was a new approach for Carpenter as well as he was so used to scoring his films while watching them. Creating the sounds in the moment. But Morricone scored the entire thing having never seen the film itself. Only having Carpenter tell him what was happening in the scenes themselves and going from there.
Of all Carpenters films, this remains the most notable one, it has the most memorable horror soundtrack, even compared to his Halloween Film, people go for this one far, far more than they do his most famous debut film.
And rightly so. The score is absolutely stunning. It captures the mood and atmosphere perfectly.
However, as great as Morricones score was. In the end several tracks of his went unused. And Carpenter had to put in his own music. It wasn’t a sleight against Morricone. The music just didn’t work for particular scenes. So Carpenter filled in the gaps himself. That’s where the shared credit comes in. But Morricone did a majority of the work himself and sampled Synth tracks for Carpenter, while doing full orchestral tracks in just the fashion Carpenter wanted.
Honestly it was a perfect paring because Carpenters own music was already one of a kind, and still is. It captures a certain mood, a vibe that other synthwave just doesn’t latch onto. The man has a clear vision and ear for what he wants and doesn’t want. Morricone is someone who makes scores that are more emotion driven and based. He makes scores that capture the heart of moments and a characters mindset in that moment. So bringing in someone with that kind of ear and talent, to of all things a shapeshifting horror science fiction. It was ground work for something truly beautiful and one of a kind. Mix that in with Carpenter adding additional music and you have what in my mind, and ears is still one of the best horror soundtracks of all time.
The main theme is, the heart of the movie. It captures the essence of the creature, the patient steady heart beat through this tone of dread and waiting. It’s just perfect. It draws in so much and really makes the movie what it is. Just like the theme in Halloween its something people instantly know or take two the moment they hear it.
Is it my favorite track? Absolutely one of yes. But one I really enjoy, because I do love dire and hopeless moments in film, not so much in life. Has got to be the track “The Probability of Infection”, It plays during Blair’s realization of what will happen when and if this creature escapes, and it pops up at several moments throughout the film, all of which come to represent moments best described as ‘All is lost’. It’s haunting and fatal. Foreboding and tense. It just carries that real feeling of doom with it that, the film really had and needed to work. It’s the most beautiful sound of despair you could ask for in the end of the world.
“Nobody Trust Anybody” sounds the most carpenter like, and again is this perfect embodiment of tense unease and mistrust. All pulled in to one sudden clash as it brings in with it the fate of Fuchs.
The score is 40 minutes of pure bliss to lose yourself. The recent rerelease on both vinyl and digital are absolutely worth it. Not just for the films score but the inclusion of all Morricone’s tracks including unused and original tracks.
This film is stunning in 4k, and each edition they pump out, my ass is buying and replacing. Because I constantly need this film. I need it in the best picture and sound possible. Seriously every tv I have ever bought, and upgrade from DVD to Bluray and even my old HD DVD player, right up to 4k. I have tested those players, new technology, and picture quality with this movie. I love it with all my heart and seeing it on the big screen, seeing it on a QLED and OLED, with atmos sound, in goddamn 4k is beautiful.
Its an absolute classic, its creepy and gory, and it’s sad that the film bombed in the box office when it released. But thankfully people found out they were wrong about it.
If it helps to give some perspective? The same week this was released? Blade Runner also came out. That too also bombed big time. Now its got a sequel and a damn series. The Thing has a video game, a prequel, and now another remake coming based off the book.
This deserves love, and I beg you to put aside any reservations on gore, because oh dear lord is this full of it to the gills. But its so so worth it if you can stomach through it and take in the story and mystery. Form your own theories and make your own murder board with red ropes and pins and a chart to show who you think caused who to get infected.
But please whatever you do, sober or otherwise. Check out this film and the score at all cost.
And with that, until tomorrow, Keep warm, and cook your own food, unless you want to end up something less than human.